Instagram users now have the option to hide likes on their posts.
Since 2019, Instagram has been testing out what it would be like to hide likes, meaning that users would not be able to see how many people liked someone else’s public post.
When Instagram first began to roll out this feature, there were concerns that it would affect how influencers work with brands. The concern continued to grow as influencers began to report a significant drop in engagement.
In order to better implement the feature in a way that would benefit those that wanted to hide likes and those that did not, Instagram has been working closely with creators and influencers. Now, Instagram is allowing users to choose whether or not they want to see likes on other people’s posts and whether or not they want other people to see the likes on their own posts.
Users can also choose to hide likes overall, or on just a post-by-post basis, depending on what they like and what makes the user more likely to continue to use the social media platform.
In terms of analytics, creators and influencers are still able to pull data to provide to brands. There are also third party platforms that allow for this function.